Call it a movement game.<\/p>\n
Call it a checkpoint game, as my friend Tom E. Curran did on\u00a0Patriots Pregame Live.<\/p>\n
Call it a truth-serum game, the kind where you find out what a team\u00a0really\u00a0is, as my friend Michael Holley suggested.<\/p>\n
Whatever you wanted to call it, Sunday’s matchup between the Patriots and the Buccaneers represented an opportunity. It was an opportunity for Mike Vrabel’s club to go from being considered a good team — a team contending for a division title, a team contending for a home playoff game — to something else.<\/p>\n
By beating the Bucs as they did, 28-23<\/a>, they now have to be entered into the conversation of championship-contending teams<\/a>. Call it like you see it. All they’ve done over the course of the last seven weeks is beat everyone in their path. At home. On the road. Good, bad and in between.<\/p>\n And make no mistake about it, the Bucs are good.\u00a0<\/p>\n They came into the game at 6-2, leading the NFC South with the help of one of the league’s best defenses. Even after a bye, even in the heat and humidity of Raymond James Stadium, even with a late turnover that nearly flipped the outcome, they couldn’t stop the Patriots.<\/p>\n Unbelievably, the Patriots are playing like one of the best of the best in football. Time to acknowledge them as such. That’s movement. That’s the truth.<\/p>\n Let’s get to this week’s What We Learned…<\/p>\n Speed kills (Part 1)<\/p>\n The Patriots racked up three touchdowns of over 50 yards to take down what was the third-best defense in football coming into the week, based on EPA per play. All three scores came from rookies who had been waiting for true “breakout” moments.<\/p>\n The first came from Kyle Williams, a third-rounder out of Washington State, who caught a crosser and outran the Bucs for 72 yards. He hit 21.78 mph, per NextGen Stats, which made him the fastest rookie ball-carrier of the season.<\/p>\n “It was sensational,” Williams said. “I don\u2019t think words could really put an explanation on that feeling. We got the look that we wanted. Shout-out to Drake [Maye] for making an alert on that play. He gets to pick one or two, and he picked me, and then once the ball was in my hands, I [saw] green grass. Then it was bon voyage after that.\u201d<\/p>\n For Williams, his moment to end the first quarter was the culmination of a great deal of work behind the scenes. After having spent most of the year focused on all three receiver positions, having received reserve reps in practice, he got more volume this past week<\/a> and was able to zero in on one position. <\/p>\n With fellow wideout Kayshon Boutte — the team’s top explosive play threat this season — out with a hamstring injury, Williams stepped up and provided a big play of his own.<\/p>\n “Kyle got out the back door,” Maye said. “He\u2019s fast. You\u2019re not going to catch him. You know, him and 32, TreVeyon [Henderson], if they get going, you\u2019re not catching them. <\/p>\n “I\u2019m just proud of him for stepping up. He only got maybe one target and made it count. Just proud of him for getting in there. He got a lot of reps this week, and there were some times on the tape where he was probably more open, and I\u2019ve just got to look his way.”<\/p>\n “I think Kyle’s play early — we really needed that one,” Vrabel added. “That was the one that we were talking about, just needing one play and he hit it, and it was great to see him have that success.”<\/p>\n Speed kills (Parts 2 and 3)<\/p>\n Williams wasn’t able to hold that title of fastest rookie for long, however, as second-round rookie running back TreVeyon Henderson blasted through the line early in the third quarter for a 55-yard score that saw him reach 22.01 mph. <\/p>\n That figure was enough to make him the fastest ball-carrier of Week 10 headed into Sunday Night Football, and one of the 10 fastest ball-carriers in the NFL this season.<\/p>\n “Just making my regular reads for that run scheme,” Henderson said of the play. “The guys up front, they made it easy for me. They opened it up, really. My biggest thing is to be decisive and hit it once I see it. I thank the guys up front for taking care of the dirty work.”<\/p>\n Henderson nearly matched that feat (21.38 mph) late in the fourth quarter when he scampered for what functioned as a game-sealing 69-yard score.<\/p>\n As impressive as that run was on its own — he followed defensive tackle Khyiris Tonga as a fullback on the play — it was made even more so given that Henderson shook off a knee injury that required Patriots medical staffers to visit him on the field and help him back to the sideline at the end of the third quarter.<\/p>\n With Rhamondre Stevenson (toe) inactive for the game, and with Terrell Jennings (knee) injured early in the game, Henderson and newcomer D’Ernest Johnson were the lone running backs in uniform and available for the majority of the contest. <\/p>\n For Henderson to push through whatever ailed him, hit 20 mph late in the game, and score? He had his head coach — who visited him on the field while injured — lauding him after the fact.<\/p>\n “With Rhamondre being out, led [to] more opportunities for TreVeyon,” Vrabel said. “He battled through on that. I got worn out running out there to see how our guys were doing as many times as I did. But I\u2019m proud of the guys that battled and competed and laid it on the line.”<\/p>\n Maye is the MVP favorite<\/p>\n